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After Andrew Bynum’s recent suspension by the Cavaliers for conduct detrimental to the team, the formerly dominating big man is on his way out
of his second city in as many years. Both the 76ers and Cavaliers gambled
hoping that Bynum would help their cause but that has ended poorly for both franchises. His unimpressive eight points and five rebounds
per game this year on an abysmal 41.9 percent from the field culminated in what one Cavs
insider brought to light:

To their credit, the Cavs only risked $6 million guaranteed
on the Bynum but with his value at an all-time low, trading him will not permit
them to take much home in return. This is the perfect situation for a Miami team
that has no true starting center. Although they are working on rehabbing with
Greg Oden, his ceiling is limited at this point. In a pre-game training session
in Sacramento, Oden did not look very mobile.

I certainly would not put my money on sites where you can
check your lines like SBO.ag
because I don’t see him holding up for more than 15 minutes per game…if that. Chris
Bosh has more than held his own this season, and just the other day reminded
everybody that he is still a star in this lead despite being teammates with two
superstars:

The Heat could use a true big man, nonetheless. It gives
Bosh the freedom to spread the floor with his above-average ability to hit
jumpers and puts LeBron back in his normal position at the small forward.
Spoelstra has been a magician working the lineups for Miami and it is exactly
because of this that he would have no problem integrating Bynum into his
rotations.

Andrew Bynum’s main issue is not on the court, though, it’s
off. And this is exactly why Miami is the perfect place for him. LeBron James
has developed into a premiere leader on and off the court (just drop by his Instagram page and you’ll see
that his camaraderie with his teammates goes beyond just his team-first
mentality in game).

The combination of King James and team president Pat Riley
is remarkably similar to another model professional sports franchise: the New
England Patriots. With Tom Brady and Robert Kraft leading the way, the Patriots
have felt comfortable enough to give opportunity to some of the NFL’s
trouble-makers, including Randy Moss and Chad Johnson (or Ochocinco or whatever
name he goes by nowadays…).

It only would take a small contract to see if Bynum
is worth the trouble and in a low-risk/high-reward opportunity, if Miami can
strike gold like they did with the recent pre-season pick-up of Michael Beasley,
a three-peat becomes even more tangible.

Underrated players in the NBA can often be mistaken for
small market players that do not get the recognition proportional to their
talent. John Wall and Kemba Walker are a couple of names that come to mind in
that light. Those guys headline the borderline stars who can’t quite make it
over the hump because a) they are not on very good teams and/or b) their market
is not conducive to media coverage. Those aren’t the guys I want to talk about
here as underrated…we’re going down to five of the guys who grind it out as
niche players that very few people outside of their teams’ respective fan bases
give the accolades that they deserve.

Plumlee is one of the top rim defenders in the league…period.
Only household names like Roy Hibbert (first in opponent’s FG percentage at the
rim), Andrew Bogut (second), Serge Ibaka (third), Robin Lopez (fourth, and okay maybe he's not a household name), and
Dwight Howard (fifth), are ahead of the Suns center who posts a stellar FG
percentage for opponents at the rim (47 percent).

In a franchise with a history of not-so-great interior
defenders (think Amar’e Stoudemire), Plumlee has been a force to help a Suns
team with some of the best guards in the league. Plumlee’s great defense gives
Eric Bledsoe and Goran Dragic the opportunity to run the fastbreaks that they
do incredibly effectively. The Suns have caught everybody by surprise this year and
their seven-footer has pleasantly contributed to that success. And this guy is
only earning $1.1 million this year…

On a team headlined by two of the league’s best shooters,
Steph Curry and Klay Thompson, the Warriors really needed a guy who could lock
down an opponent’s perimeter threats. With the addition of Andre Iguodala as an
elite perimeter defender, Green’s work as a defensive stopper has been ever increasingly glossed
over.

Green is just a couple spots outside of the top-10 in
defensive rating (per NBA.com, at least 25 games played and 15 minutes per
game) at 93.9 points per game. Of note, five players with better defensive
ratings are part of the stingiest defense in the league in Indiana (Hibbert,
PG24, West, Hill, and CJ Watson).

Although Green’s free throw percentage has taken a steep
nose-dive from 82 to 53 in just the past year, his value off the bench is as a guy
who comes in when the Warriors need a three or a stop. This, in combination
with his energy, is something that has kept his team in games…and occasionally
moments like this happen.

His versatility and energy off the bench provide the spark
that the Warriors need when opposing defenders lock onto Steph. The game-winner
vs. Miami last year shows two things: 1) Draymond can step up when called upon
in the biggest moments (as he also showed in the playoffs while knocking down
huge threes), and 2) his coach has enough faith in him to give him the
opportunity to have the ball in those moments. Curry couldn’t free himself off
screen in that final play so a backdoor cut caught Shane Battier off-guard. Jarrett Jack knew that the play was designed for a move like that and was able
to hit him. Ironically enough, the guy that Green beat to the basket (Battier)
is exactly the type of player that Green is striving to be.

At a scorching 22 points per game, 44 percent from three,
and 86 percent from the line, Arron Afflalo is one of the best players at a
not-so-deep shooting guard position. I realize that this is drawing a fine line from the Wall-Walker line of stardom but Afflalo is criminally underrated so I'm putting him in this conversation especially considering he is a clear front-runner to
win the NBA’s Most Improved Player Award in 2014. So even though Afflalo's role on his team is far greater than the other four, by being in that conversation for most improved player, he deserves mentioning in this list.

Afflalo is one of only six players with at least 200 total points off
catch and shoot opportunities (per NBA.com), trailing only Klay
Thompson, Kyle Korver, and Dirk Nowitzki in a category where great shooters
shine. A lot of teams would love a
guy like Afflalo who is on a 5-year/$37 million contract. His recent
career-high of 43 points vs. the Sixers showed that this guy is capable of
scoring from everywhere on the court.

The one thing that is worthy of note is that Afflalo is best
in the mid-range game…an area that is quickly losing relevancy in the NBA "where efficiency matters." If
this part of the game continues to go by the wayside, some players may suffer.
Whether Afflalo is one of them remains to be seen, but with his all-around
offensive game and the fact that he plays a position whose only big names are
Harden, Kobe, and Wade, Afflalo has value to any NBA team in the playoff hunt.

Portland’s success is worthy of notice in a Western
conference that is extremely deep. (In stark contrast to the NBA’s E-league) and the duo of Damian Lillard and LaMarcus Aldridge are the faces
of that huge surprise. While I did predict the Blazers to earn a playoff spot, I certainly did not see them sitting atop the West, as they are currently.

If it's not Afflalo, Batum has to be the most wildly underrated player in the
league with an 18 percent usage rate and the best offensive rating in the league (per NBA.com/stats, played at
least 25 games). While offensive rating is not the best measure of a player’s
individual contribution to a team, it is a piece in the puzzle that explains just how
valuable Batum is. The Blazers' forward's value on offense
is both as a shooter (39 percent from three and 81 percent from the line) but
also as a finisher where he hits 75 percent of his shots in the restricted
area. By comparison, LeBron James is at 78 percent—on, of course, a significant
larger sample size. His 14 points, six rebounds, and five assists per game are no small contribution.

Jackson earned some additional playing time when Westbrook
went down for the first time in his career during the 2013 playoffs. It would
be remiss to say that Jackson took over successfully as the Thunder lost games
2 through 5 to the Grizzlies but he did contribute a respectable amount for a then-22-year-old
second year player who had never started an NBA game before. 14 points, six
rebounds, four assists, 92 percent from the line and 50 percent from the
field?? And yet because the Thunder had such lofty expectations with the
second-best player in the league on their squad, Jackson’s contribution went
unnoticed. And it has been unnoticed by the media until this happened yesterday:

Scott Brooks noticed, though. Jackson’s minutes nearly
doubled from last season to this season and it has had a tremendously positive
impact on the team. Brooks’ stubbornness to stick with the five
man-unit of Westbrook-Sefolosha-Durant-Ibaka-Perkins is questionable, but to see he has
given the Jackson-Westbrook tandem in the backcourt some minutes is the right move. Per
82games.com, the most successful lineups that the Thunder have put out are with
Jackson on the floor either running point or at the 2. He is the perfect man
for a three-man rotation of guards in OKC. Just imagine if the first two were
Westbrook and Harden...

Kobe Bryant falling victim to another horrendous injury is
no joke and certainly not a good thing for the NBA. But in a peculiar way,
nothing better could have happened for the Los Angeles Lakers. Bryant is lucky
that the injury requires no surgery and “only” six weeks recovery time, but the
reality is that there is no reason he should come back this season.

I completely agree with Charles Barkley, who said on TNT that the Lakers should shut down Kobe Bryant for
the season. There is absolutely no benefit to Bryant returning and preserving
his machismo in an effort to prove that he can sustain a level of greatness
in the NBA. Father Time may be knocking on the door and nearly two decades in the NBA is a lot of wear on one human body. Even if he returned right at the six week mark, I would put my money at Sports Betting Dime on him having absolutely
no chance at getting the Lakers past the first round.

Kobe had a sluggish start in returning from his injury. However, he began to show promise of returning to form in the latter half of his six-game stint
this season so far, two games in which he put up 20-plus points on at least 50
percent from the field and both times 100 percent from the line (granted on
only a total of five free throws).

However, as expected, his game is increasingly predicated on
jumpers and threes and he is not there yet with either shot. In his six games
played this season, he was 3-of-16 from three. You could put Dwight Howard at
the free throw line beyond the arc and probably get similar results.

Kobe Bryant's shot chart for the 2013-14 season as of December 20.

Kobe also clearly was struggling to mesh with his new
teammates. The Lakers were above .500 before the Mamba returned and now they’re
back below that mark. That’s not to say that the Lakers are a great team without
Kobe—just that they had some chemistry that he did break. Eventually that’s
going to be resolved but the best time for that resolution is in the off- and
pre-season.

The reality is that the West is so deep—with 10 teams at or
above .500—that the Lakers have no business vying for an eighth-seed…and it won't happen in 2014. I discussed the Kobe Bryant conundrum a couple months ago and this is the awkwardly perfect
break (no pun intended) where Kobe can rest and truly return to full strength while putting Los Angeles in the best
position to join the #rigginforWiggins campaign. (A more in-depth discussion
about tanking is in the works for a future article so I’ll hold off on further
discussion about that for now.)

My instinct says the Mamba Mentality will win out and he
returns to the court as soon as he can but if he and the organization take a
step back for one second, the best option for both Kobe and the Lakers at this
point is to keep him on the bench in a suit.

Andre Iguodala has not impressed anybody with his own statistical
brilliance. He didn’t do so during his tenure with the 76ers and Nuggets and thus far has
averaged only 12 points, six rebounds, and four assists per game as a member of
the Golden State Warriors. This was one of the reasons that he wasn't very popular in Philadelphia - a city that wanted a remix of the previously highlight-reel worthy AI, Allen Iverson. He seems to have found the perfect place in Golden State because how he impacts this Warriors team as a “glue guy” is clear when
you look at how his teammates play when he is on and off the court.

Over the past two years, David Lee and Klay Thompson have been subject to occasional criticism from Warriors fans and analysts for what can sometimes be streaky play. Although last year I personally viewed Lee as a vital cog to the Warriors success, his play has dropped off a bit this year. Thompson on the other hand has been a "wait-and-see" type player as he is finding his way in his first couple years in the league. With his shooting and defense, nobody doubts this guy can play a very high level in the NBA. His highs have shown that, but last year his lows made people question his consistency. This year, Klay's performance has improved throughout his entire game (from driving to the basket to his defense) and in each of the past two years, he is undoubtedly an important half of the #SplashBrothers.

Andre Iguodala fits in here with a LeBron James-esque role. Although Iguodala certainly is not as great of a player, like LeBron, he really does make his teammates better. Lee and Thompson have both played 14 games (out
of 36 and 39, respectively) with Iguodala on the floor and their performance
from all over the floor staggeringly improves with that guy who only averages
four assists per game out there with them.

David Lee

Iguodala On

Iguodala Off

Iguodala Effect

Restricted Area

63.2%

56.2%

+ 7.0%

In the paint

47.7%

36.2%

+ 11.5%

Mid-range

31.0%

21.9%

+ 8.1%

Left corner 3

----

----

----

Right corner 3

----

----

----

Top of key 3

----

----

----

Klay Thompson

Iguodala On

Iguodala Off

Iguodala Effect

Restricted Area

69.0%

60.7%

+ 8.3%

In the paint

53.8%

30.8%

+ 23.0%

Mid-range

46.9%

42.0%

+ 4.9%

Left corner 3

55.0%

38.9%

+ 16.1%

Right corner 3

44.4%

53.3%

- 8.9%

Top of key 3

49.1%

35.3%

+ 13.8%

Both Thompson and Lee took
more than one shot per game from all areas exceptThompson for the following shots: in the paint (Iguodala on), on the right corner three (Iguodala on), and for both corner threes
when Iguodala was off the court. The area where Thompson took the fewest shots was also
where the Iguodala effect was in the negative. Stats accurate as of December 18.

The same wild improvement cannot be seen in a player like
Steph Curry but that does not come as a surprise considering Steph's style of play is much different than D-Lee and Klay. Curry is his own beast and
his game is largely predicated on creating his own shot, something that he will
do whether or not the former Nuggets star is on the floor. Klay is more of a spot-up shooter and Lee needs spacing on the floor to get shots inside the paint. Clearly, Iguodala gives both of them that - something that even Curry cannot do alone.

As a team, the numbers tell the same story that
you would qualitatively argue if just watching the Warriors games. The Iguodala effect on the Warriors
is not something that you can go to the basic stat sheet to analyze. With the “mini-LeBron”
on the floor, the Warriors improve on every
single type of shot on the floor (restricted area, in the paint, mid-range,
and all types of threes).

A closer look at the aspect of the game that is most
important to the Warriors success reveals just how valuable Dre is to the
Warriors. The on-court
vs. off-court difference with Iguodala in three-pointers is jaw-dropping: the
Warriors shoot 15 percent higher on
the left corner three (53 vs. 38), six percent higher on the right corner three
(42 vs. 36), and eight percent higher on the above-the-break 3 (46 vs. 38).

This difference is accentuated when you consider the
Warriors take three more threes a game with him on the court (17.7 vs. 14.6).

What about their overall team performance? This might sum up
the Iguodala effect the best: the Warriors score 20 points per 100 possessions more than their opponent with him on the
court compared to when he's not there.

And of course, he can also do
things like this when called upon:

Is it hard to put readily digestible value on a guy who
gives less-than-glamarous PRA per game numbers? Yes, but the presence that Andre
Iguodala brings to the Warriors is something that will make the difference in his
team competing for a championship or sitting at home during late May. At least as we can tell so far, GM Bob Myers picked up the perfect guy to fit with the Warriors this past off-season in Andre Iguodala.

Big news for the
Toronto Raptors. Less than a year after acquiring the 27-year old star forward
Rudy Gay, they decided to trade him away to the Sacramento Kings. The exchange
for this trade is John Salmons, Greivis Vasquez, Chuck Hayes and Patrick
Patterson. Aaron Gray and Quincy Acy will be shipped to Sacramento along with
Gay as a part of this trade.

Well, if it’s big news
for the Raptors to send away their star forward in such a short period of time
then it’s much bigger news for the Sacramento Kings to actually receive Gay. In
fact, Kings fans should be excited. Now just because of this addition but
because the new management of the team seems determined to shake things up and
try to make this team look better.

This move only make
sense for the Kings. They trade away Greivis Vasquez, who certainly is a
reliable point guard but now they will inject Isaiah Thomas into the lineup.
Thomas has been playing exceptionally well this season for the Kings and he has
shown that he can be very productive. So, the first positive side-effect of
this deal is Thomas’s insertion to the starting group. Thomas is averaging 17.8
points and 4.9 assists in just 27.7 minutes of action this season. Now that he
will see more playing time, he might really get out to a breakaway season.

Now, it’s true that
Rudy Gay is shooting at career-lows up to this point of the season. Although he
is putting up 19.4 points per game, he is going just 38.8 percent from the
floor and 37.3 percent from three-point range. Now, Gay also has a $19 million
player option for the next season, which would simply kill the Kings’ salary
cap if he decides to stay in Sacramento. As recently reported, there have been
no talks between the team and Gay if he will opt-out this summer or stay with
the Kings.

The Kings won’t have
an easy time trying to adjust their play to the new reality. Gay is a player
who demands the ball and so is Thomas. And did we mention there is also
DeMarcus Cousins on the roster? The certain fact is that Head Coach Mike Malone
will have a tough time solving the puzzle. Not only on the offensive end, but
on defense, too. Gay is a player who isn’t known for his good defensive skills.

However, there is no
denial that Gay, under a new coach and with new surroundings, will have the
chance to finally find a good pace. He will have the chance to be a member of a
young and energetic team, which has nothing more to prove than to just get
better each season.

Gay’s presence will
certainly cheer up a bit Kings fans. They will have one more reason to go to
the Sleep Train Arena. Hopefully, Gay starts to find his role in Sacramento and
bonds well with the team. However, at present, fans of the team should be measurably
optimistic.

It is no secret that Carmelo Anthony is not happy with
the New York Knicks and would not mind being traded. As one of the best scorers in the game, it has been embarrassing
for him to lose to the likes of the Bobcats, Pistons, and Wizards. In last
Sunday’s game vs. the Pelicans, after some questionable defense by Anthony, Iman Shumpert railed on the superstar scorer during a subsequent timeout for what looked like sub-maximal effort.

Thus far this season, Melo has also received no shortage of criticism from league
analysts and media personalities, either:

In all this tumultuousness, Stephen A. Smith reported on ESPN that he’s “hearing [Carmelo Anthony is] out.
Gone. Unless the money disappears elsewhere…he’s not trying to stay [in
New York].” And while Anthony’s personality is questionable, there is no doubting his offensive talent. That is exactly why the Chicago
Bulls are the perfect situation for him. After spending some quality time with
one of my favorite online simulation machines, the ESPN Trade Machine, I came up with this viable
(financially speaking) trade:

Chicago Bulls get Carmelo
Anthony and Raymond Felton

New York Knicks get
Carlos Boozer, Luol Deng, and Jimmy Butler

Bill
Simmons suggested in his latest column that the Luol Deng is a viable trade
bait option but only followed it up with suggestions for relatively small trades. I say, Bulls: go for it all.
Who knows what’s going to happen with Derrick Rose and in a city built for
superstar scorers, Carmelo Anthony could handle the primary scoring load that
would be required of him. When (if?) Derrick Rose comes back healthy, he really
will need to re-invent himself as a point guard. Although his injuries were not
directly the result of his style of play, his explosiveness + his small frame =
a high chance disappointing NBA career. Grant Hill and Bill Walton are names that I have
already seen thrown around.

Rose won't feel like he needs to go into full hero-mode on offense. Anthony gives Derrick Rose the ability to remain a playmaker but not a drive-at-all-costs playmaker. If Roy Hibbert or Serge Ibaka are
waiting in the paint ready to punish him, he can dish it out as opposed to
forcing up a crazy (but entertaining) shot. Melo also spreads the floor for
Rose, allowing the Chicago native to take advantage of his quickness to
hopefully beat his man and the help defense. (Side note: for this reason I don’t like the Kobe-Melo combo
that I’ve been hearing. Two guys who want to go for 30 every night? Sounds like a disaster waiting to happen.) Rose and Melo would perfectly complement each other. Rose, Hinrich, Anthony, Gibson, and Noah…I think this Shaq and Chuck GIF might represent
how Bulls fans would feel with a starting lineup like that. Coach Tom Thibodeau could manage the egos.

Now…would the Knicks accept this offer? At the time I
submitted this trade into The Machine, Hollinger’s analysis actually told me that the
Knicks got the better end of the deal! The way I look at it, this trade makes sense for the Knicks
for three reasons:

Jimmy Butler would help add some defensive
tenacity to a Knicks team in dire need of perimeter defenders. He is still nursing
a foot injury which could help the Knicks if they want to go full tank mode this year. NY
isn’t getting the talent in a single individual but Butler is one piece in the
chunk of the Bulls core that could also help bring the Knicks' storied franchise back
to relevancy.

Carlos Boozer is still productive. Just ask the
Miami Heat, who lost to the Bulls on Thursday in a game where Boozer dropped 27
and 9. He could slide right in with the Knicks big man rotation of Chandler, Bargnani,
and the corpse of Amar’e Stoudemire. Maybe even start shopping Bargnani for
another player you can take off the books for next summer to help bid for LeBron.

Luol Deng finishes off the new-look Knicks with
another team-first veteran who also happens to be in the final year of a
contract. It’s a win-win for the Knicks picking him up because they have the
option to keep a solid vet or dump him at the end of the year in what will be
the summer of LeBron (& Co.), part two.

Who says no first? Probably the Knicks, but (big surprise) I would take it
if I were them. If they have learned anything from the Lakers this past
off-season with the Dwight Howard saga,
it’s that you don’t want to lose a star for nothing. If you can’t see that
Deng-Butler-Boozer is worth Carmelo, at least you can see that
Deng-Butler-Boozer is more than nothing.

Just for kicks (and because The Machine is too much fun), I
have another Carmelo to the Bulls trade in the works. Enter the Houston Rockets
and the Oklahoma City Thunder in the mix and you get:

The Bulls are doing essentially the same trade (Anthony for
the BDB core). The Knicks are, too, except in losing Boozer’s skill and
contract they gain another expiring contract and a dirt cheap contract. Canaan and
his 21 points, 10 assists (league leading), and 4 rebounds per game in the D-league might even be ready to contribute at the NBA level.

Houston accomplishes their goal of losing Omer Asik and in
the process they get a perfect complimentary big man for Dwight Howard who can
hit the mid-range jumper (not from the right side) with reasonable efficiency.

Carlos Boozer's shot chart through 12/7/13.

The Thunder are also loving this trade. No more Perkins?
Check. Efficient offensive center? Check. And another thing I love about this
trade is it puts Jeremy Lamb on the court more. At 46 percent from the field, Lamb is putting up 16.8 points per
36 minutes so far this season in only 20 minutes per game. Westbrook-Lamb-Durant-Ibaka-Asik.
That team has NBA title contender written all over it.

So take your pick, New York. There will be options out there...maybe not the ideal one in your eyes, but it doesn't take a statistician to tell you something is better than nothing.

Kobe Bryant’s 2-year/$48.5 million extension ensured that he
will retire as a life-long member of the Los Angeles Lakers. En route to an
incredible five NBA championships, 15 All-Star appearances, two scoring titles,
an MVP award, and countless other accolades, Kobe will go down as one of the
greatest players in NBA history. That is indisputable.

But this contract seals the fact that he will also go down
as one of the league’s most selfish players.

The Lakers just underwent a tumultuously traumatic
experience in 2012-13 where injuries and the Dwight Howard saga led to vast
disappointment. Little blame for last year should fall on the sturdy shoulders of Bryant,
who at age 34 managed to put up 27.3 points per game along with a career-tying
high of 6.0 assists per game. Whatever the Lakers demanded of him, as pure Kobe
fashion calls for, he tried to answer the bell. It is this very stubborn-to-a-fault drive that has prevented him from realizing that the bell tolls for him and he must relinquish
full power of the Lakers.

What he did with taking this much money was nothing short of
crippling the Lakers for the next two-years…and probably more.

As has already been well-discussed in the NBA blogosphere,
Kobe’s tremendous contract limits the Lakers ability to attract more than a
single big name and might even hamper that potential suitor’s desire to sign.
The message from the Lakers front office that made Bryant again the highest
paid player is clear: this is Kobe Bryant’s team.

Why would LeBron James, Carmelo Anthony, Kevin Love, or any
other superstar want to come into a situation like that? Setting aside the fact
that Kobe Bryant has proven throughout his career to more than frequently alienate
teammates (all the way from the worst in Smush Parker and Kwame Brown to the
best in Dwight Howard and Shaquille O’Neal), the financials just don’t add up.
You simply can’t put together a reasonable squad around Kobe and another max
contract player and expect to fill out your roster with anything better than
D-league players.

Lakers Nation worships the ground that Kobe walks on. Delivering five NBA championships is no joke and providing
inspiration for a generation is something that’s priceless.

But look at Kobe Bryant throughout his career—the feud with
Shaq, the requests for trades, the battles with Phil Jackson and Andrew Bynum, hefty criticism of Pau Gasol and Dwight Howard—and you’ll realize that it would be criminally incomplete to say that Kobe cares about 1) his team and 2) about winning.

He wants to be a winner only if he is the main man. And as
such he is not all about the team. He plays with a me-first attitude in a team
sport…who just happens to be gifted enough to be able to cover up that major
flaw.

Finally, he will see that it costs him. In the twilight of
his career he still can look at guys across generations in the NBA today doing
things that he could have done. LeBron James, the best player in the game, took
a pay-cut to win a championship. Kevin Durant likewise took a pay-cut to stay
in OKC (although results have been murky). Tim Duncan, the last piece of greatness
in Kobe’s era, took not only a pay-cut but a diminished role in the Spurs. Even the original Big Three in Boston finagled around the salary cap to put together a championship run.

Kobe
Bryant, on the other hand, is sitting on the sideline collecting north of $30
million or about 133 percent of LeBron’s salary in 2014. And nobody knows what his
return will be like. So, the conclusion here is very simple:

Kobe Bryant does not
care about winning as much as LeBron, Durant, and Duncan.

If he did, there would have been no feud with Shaq. There
would have been no ousting of Phil Jackson. There would have been no demands to
be traded when the wins faded in the mid-00s (largely thanks to his desire to
dismantle the great pieces around him). And there certainly would not have been
a $49 million contract over two years that all but voids any relevancy of the Lakers in both a legendary draft
class and a couple huge free agency periods.

Kobe wants to win with his rules and he has gotten away with
it many times before because of his immense talent and work ethic. What's sad is the fact that his ego got in the way of even more greatness.

Instead, that ego puts the Lakers in a hole. The future is bleak with Kobe taking home excessive dollars. Lakers fans now may say that he has earned it, but when it the
misery unfolds, the tune will change as quickly as it once did. When free agents that could have
signed start flying by, the whispers will begin. Shouldn’t he retire? Are his
legs really going to hold up? Can he carry the Lakers to a championship?

About a year ago, I made a bet with a friend that Kobe
Bryant will never win another NBA championship. Thanks to Kobe himself, I am even more confident that that was bet well placed because Kobe Bryant will never win
another NBA championship. And his legacy just might be tainted in the process.

LeBron James is at the top of the basketball world with
back-to-back NBA MVPs and Finals MVPs under his belt. As if that wasn’t enough,
he’s off to a white-hot start already only ten games into the 2013-14 NBA
season (62 percent shooting from the field and 52 percent from three). Even with an already astounding resume, the reality is that LeBron should have not four, but six MVPs, at age 28.

The 2006 NBA MVP race has gone down infamously in history as the
MVP that Steve Nash should not have won. Popular opinion has given
the nod to Kobe Bryant in that race. Then again in 2011, LeBron was robbed at
the hands of a young superstar point guard, Derrick Rose. MVP voting in the history of the NBA
is certainly filled with suspicious results, but these are two glaring mistakes.

To the voters’ credit, they don’t have an easy task. NBA
voting must take into account more than who is the best player at a position in
the league (most NFL MVPs are quarterbacks unless a running back has a historic
season) or who is the best offensive player in the league (defense does factor
into an NBA players success while in the NFL a player is only on one side of
the ball and for baseball, defensive skill is given little consideration for
the most part).

Kobe Bryant did join an exclusive club in 2006 by averaging
an incredible 35.4 points per game, becoming only the fifth player in NBA
history to do so (Wilt Chamberlain, Michael Jordan, Rick Barry, and Elgin
Baylor). He was certainly more deserving that Nash. But LeBron James managed a nearly equally impressive 31.4 points per
game while racking up two assists per game more than Bryant. So if you were to
look at scoring output for the team (points + assists x 2), Bryant and LeBron had equal scoring outputs—and both greater
than Steve Nash.

Statistic (2006)

LeBron James

Steve Nash

Kobe Bryant

PER

28.1

23.3

28.0

Win shares per 48

.232

.212

.224

Points

31.4

18.8

35.4

Rebounds

7.0

4.2

5.3

Assists

6.6

10.5

4.5

Steals

1.6

0.8

1.8

FG percentage

.480

.512

.450

FT percentage

.738

.921

.850

Team record

50 – 32

54 – 28

45 – 37

The individual statistics for 2006 give the clear advantage
to LeBron, with the highest numbers posted in two of the more telling metrics
for an individual player: PER and WS/48. PER measures efficiency and WS/48
measures a player’s contribution to the team and a combination of the two
really do allude to a team’s “most valuable player.”

Both Bryant and James had terrible supporting casts in 2006,
so that point is moot. This was the first playoff appearance of LeBron’s career
and he sustained a more elite level of play throughout the season that peaked
with a nine-game stretch in which he averaged 39 points, eight assists, and
seven rebounds per game. That hadn’t been done since Oscar Robertson in 1965. Without a doubt, this stretch is more impressive for an MVP-caliber season than Kobe Bryant’s 81-point show vs. Toronto.
(And of course, James was the better defender—a claim that defensive win shares
and the individual defensive rating metrics support.)

The voters were scared to give the MVP award to a
21-year-old kid who had broken onto the NBA scene and nearly immediately taken
over the game. At that time, the youngest MVP winner was 23-year-old Wes Unseld
from way back in 1969 (we’ll get to who the youngest MVP is currently
soon enough). And when competitors like Bryant and Nash had both posted
impressive numbers they made the excuse to vote against the player who had
truly earned the right to the award. If you give a barely legal adult the MVP
already, will the motivation for the rest of his career dwindle? That very well could have
played into the logic of the voters because clearly the Akron native should
have taken home the 2006 MVP honors.

In 2011, somehow Derrick Rose ran away with the MVP. While
this came as little surprise to most people, most everything about that season
shows that not only was LeBron James more deserving…but so was Dwight Howard!

The leftover hatred of LeBron’s ESPN “special” where he articulated his desire to take his talents
to South Beach had to have something to do with it because, again, the numbers
clearly show LeBron was more deserving than Derrick Rose (and Dwight Howard).

Statistic (2011)

LeBron James

Derrick Rose

Dwight Howard

PER

27.3

23.5

26.1

Win shares per 48

.244

.208

.235

Points

26.7

25.0

22.9

Rebounds

7.5

4.1

14.1

Assists

7.0

7.7

1.4

Steals

1.6

1.0

1.4

FG percentage

.510

.445

.593

FT percentage

.759

.858

.596

Team record

58 – 24

62 – 20

52 – 30

The only individual statistics above that Derrick Rose beat
LeBron in were assists, by a marginal amount, and free throw percentage. It wasn’t like a battle of deciding which
position meant more to their team. At least Nash (in 2006) had the 50-40-90 numbers and
10+ assists going for him. In 2011, Rose was a scorer…who was not a better scorer than
LeBron.

The Big Three gained infamy that year for losing to the
Dallas Mavericks in the 2011 NBA Finals, but the fact that it was a “Big Three”
doesn’t lessen LeBron’s impact on the team. One could make a very strong argument that the Bulls
without Derrick Rose would have done just fine. The Heat without LeBron would
not have been pretty. Just look at the Bulls performance in 2013 without their
star point guard…a laudable semifinal appearance. Statistically, LeBron and
D-Rose’s relative contribution to their respective teams in 2011 show LeBron was the
more valuable player (higher efficiency, PER, and overall contribution to the
team, WS/48, among other parameters).

Ironically, in 2011 the voters had no problem breaking
Cousy’s record for youngest MVP award. At 22 years old, the Chicago native
became the youngest MVP in NBA history. Maybe LeBron’s brilliance at such a
young age helped pave the way for voters to feel more comfortable giving the
award to someone so young?

I won’t claim to get into the voters heads, but I will say
this: LeBron James should be a six-time MVP right
now. And that would put him in the debate for top-five greatest players of all time…at age 28.